Make an Alien Abduction Lamp

30 March 2009588,784 views86 Comments

by heather

This is an entry in the Living With LindsayFive Dollar Challenge! The challenge was to make a home decor item for $5 or less. My project is inspired by Lasse Klein's conceptual Alien Abduction Lamp. The lamps are still being developed and are not available for sale yet.* (update 2010: oh yes, the lamp is now available). I thought it would be fun to make one for my own personal use out of materials I found at the dollar store.

When I was shopping for materials, I couldn't find any toy cows (a cow has to be the one being messed with by the aliens, right?), so I bought a plastic "Noah's Ark" set that contained a pig (although there were only one of each animal in the set, so I hardly see how that qualifies as a Noah's Ark set!) After everything was done, I found a farm set that had a cow in it at Target's dollar spot, so I had to get it to make the lamp perfect!

Project Materials:

Large-lipped bowl, $1

Smaller bowl, $.25 (mine was marked down)

Acrylic drinking glass, $1

Touch light, $1

Package of farm animals, $1

3 Aliens I happened to find in the coin-op machines on the way out, $.75

Cutting implements to cut hole in one bowl and the top of the glass, such as a Dremel, drill, or tin snips (we used the latter two--a pain)

Batteries to operate the light

Paint (we used black spray paint and silver craft acrylic, if you don't have them, cost less than $3 for both)

To make:

1. Dismantle touch light so it will fit inside larger bowl, facing down. You will either discard all the white parts, or you might need to trim the plastic rim down so the smaller bowl will fit snugly on top of everything.

2. Cut a hole in the larger bowl about the size of the bottom of the acrylic glass. We used a drill and tin snips because we don't have a Dremel, and it was kind of a mess. Hopefully you have better tools!

3. Cut a hole in the bottom of the acrylic glass.

4. Put the acrylic glass upside down on the table, put the large bowl right side up on top of the glass to test for fit. You won't want to glue them together now because when it's all set up nicely, you'll paint the bowls flying saucer color.

5. Put the touch light face down into the larger bowl.

6. Place smaller bowl on top of everything, face down.

7. How does it look? If good, then paint the bowls black and/or silver.

8. When everything's painted, glue the appropriate parts together. Leave the top bowl unglued so you can turn the lamp on and off, and change batteries when needed.

9. Set it up and enjoy!

Here's the lamp in the daytime.

*It goes without saying that I made this for personal use and am giving instructions on how I made mine only for your personal use. Please don't make copies to sell--that's bad! It's unethical to rip off independent designers, and it's not great to rip off mass-market designers for selling purposes, either! Be original in your Etsy shop!

Disclosure: this article may contain affiliate links or other forms of sponsored content. Opinions are 100% the author's. Full disclosure policy.

Very nice! :-) Art dont need to cost much.
Want to show you my lamp to. Made with a IKEA flower glass vase, green doormat, uplight lamp, reflector from a lamp, bottom from a sealing lamp, LED-light from IKEA, Aliens made of cernit, cow from a toy store. a lens, etc..http://www.hofstad.biz/42423729

We covered an Alien Abduction Lamp back in the ’00′s (that “aughts” thing never really caught on, eh?) but not everyone wants to shell out $179 at Amazon for a lamp like this. So now we’ve found a DIY version that you can …

# 25 February 2011 at 11:31 am

Jessica said:

OMG!!! That is amazing! I’m doing my daughter’s room in cows, and was wanting to find a lamp but I came across this and I have to do this for her room lol. It is just sooo neat. Thank you.

[…] on your Mother in Laws heirloom list…then you’re on your own. I got this tutorial from Heather’s entry into the Five Dollar Day Challenge thrown out by Lindsey from Living with Lindsey in 2009. […]

What kid wouldn’t love an alien abduction lamp on their bed side table. There’s some electrical work to be done by moms & dads but overall it’s a great kid project. Now you just have to push them towards some sort of alien book or science proj…

# 23 August 2011 at 1:14 pm

Patrick said:

This was an Awesome tutorial. I had seen the original lamp MANY times and wanted one but couldn’t justify paying almost $100.

Instead of using a touch light I rigged an old lamp fixture up with a nightlight. Used the same idea of the bowls, plastic cup, etc. etc. Only this way I can choose to turn it on and off without having to remove the bowls. 3 Tiny screws hold the bowls in place so I can change the bulb at a later date (to any color too!). Used plastic apoxy to hold the UFO at a slant.

I’m thinking about cutting holes in the top and trying to find something to give it some green windows, but that will have to be at a later time.

(As I’m typing this) I just received a request to make a much larger one with salad bowls and large flower vase as beam, and a normal light bulb as well. If I decide to make this I will post pics as well.

[…] As last year's number one post, it's no surprise that this project is still wildly popular. It's another of Heather's awesome creations and it's gotten linky love from all corners of the web. Will it be just as well-loved in 2012? [read the post] […]

[…] with a sense of humor? I know my guys would think this was cool. Again I was just cruising Dollar Store Crafts and found this. Check out their blog for some fun and wonderful ideas to do on the cheap. […]

# 7 January 2012 at 9:23 am

Terri said:

I’ve got an added idea, if someone wants to spend a little more money: buy an electric cord [or use an old one from a lamp], take a strand of old christmas lights, use approximately 10-11(?) of them, drill spaceship designs into the bowls, top or bottom, or around it, drill a slightly larger hole in the bottom upright bowl to feed the cord thru; put the christmas bulbs thru the drilled holes, dab of hot glue to hold in place, put a white or yellow light poking out the bottom (or green), electrical tape one end of christmas lights (to keep from getting shocked), then on the other end of the christmas lights, twist each wire strand to the electric cord, electrical tape each, and for safety put a wire tie around them, pull in the cord and your spaceship comes alive with different lights ~ coming to the get the cow….of course drill holes, paint bowls, wire up, hot glue, etc….what do you think of that idea?

[…] super cheap lamp based on this slightly more awesome lamp that is not super cheap. It is the Alien Abduction Lamp. The creation of the tutorial for the replica lamp was actually because of a contest. The contest […]

[…] and watching science fiction stories about UFOs and Extraterrestrials. You could also make an alien abduction lamp(out of dollar store materials) or plant some Kohlrabi in your garden (it looks kind of alien to […]

# 7 October 2012 at 7:32 am

Annette said:

this is will be in my cubicle at work on Monday morning!!!!! love it! Thanks for sharing!

[…] black thing behind the piggy bank is my version of Heather’s (from Dollar Store Crafts) Alien Abduction Lamp. Mine looks a bit more like the Vince Lombardi trophy than a spaceship, but in my defense it […]

[…] The black thing behind the piggy bank is my version of Heather’s (from Dollar Store Crafts) Alien Abduction Lamp. Mine looks a bit more like the Vince Lombardi trophy than a spaceship, but in my defense it […]